The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1887-12-08
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
An Interesting Discourse Evolved
From concord and Discord."
The Laying of the Worlds Cornerstone
and the Grand Peace Jubilee-Sin the
Harsh Discord i'm the Orchestra
of the Universe.

L.
lyn Tabernacle was concord and Dis
cord" predicated on the following text:
5 Who1aid the cornerstone thereof, when the
morning stars sang together.-Job xxxviii, 81
DR.. Talmage said: We have all seen
the ceremony at the laying of the corner
stone of church, asylum or Masonic tenn.
pie. Into the hollow of the stone were
placed scrolls of history and import ant
documents, to be suggestive it, one or two
hundred years after, the building should
be destroyed by fire or torn down. We
remember the silver trowel or iron ham.
mer that smote the square piece of granite
into sanctity. We remember some vener.
able man who presided, welding the
trowel or hammer. We remember also
the music, as the choir stood on the scat
tered stones aud timber of the building
about to be constructed. The leaves of
the notebooks fiuttered in the wind, and
were turned over with great rustling,
and we remember how the bass, barytone,
tenor, contralto and soprano voices COM
mingled. They had for many days been
rehearsing the special programme that it
might be worthy of the cornerstone lay
ing.
In my text the poet Of Uz calls us to a
foundation of this great temple Of a world.
The cornerstone was a block of light and
the trowel was of celestial crystal. All
about and on the entertainments of cloud
stood the angelic choristers, unrolling
their Ibrettos of overture, and other
worlds clappsd shining cymbals while
the ceremony went ON, and God, the
architect,by stroke Of light after stroke of
1irh to1 thal Iofn
world, with mountains for pillars, and
the sky for frescoed ceiling, and flower
ing fields for floor, and sunrise and mid
night aurora for upholstery.
Who laid the cornerstone thereof when the
morning stars sang together.
The fact is that the whole universe
was complete cadence, an unbroken
dithyramb,a musical portfolio. The great
sheet of immensely had been spread out,
and written on it were the stars, the
smaller of them minims, the larger of
them sustained notes. The meteors
marked the staccato passages, the whole
heavens gamut. with all sounds, int O.
nations and modulations, the space be-
tween the worlds a musical interval,
trembling of stellar light, quaver, the
thunder bass clef the wind among the
trees treble clef. This is the way God
made all things perfect harmony.
But ono day harp string snapped in
the great orchestra. One day a voice
sounded ont of tune. One day dis
cord, harsh and terrific, grated upon the
glorious autiphone. 1t was sin that made
: the dissonance, and that harsh discord
has boon sounding through the centuries.
All the work of Christians, and philan-
thropists, and refoFmers of all ages is to
stop that discord, and get all things back
into the perfect harmony which was
heard at the laying of the cornerstone
when the morning stars sang together
Before l get through, if I am divinely
helped, will make it plain that sin is
discord and Righteousness is harmony.
That things in general are out of tune is
rs plain as to a musicians ear is the I'M
happy clash of clarionet and bassoon in
an orchestral rendering.
Tho worlds health out of tune. Weak
lung and the atmosphere in collision, dis =
ordered eye and MONDAY light in quar-
rel, rheumatic limb and damp weather in
struggle, neuralgias, and pneumonias,
and consumptions, and epilepsies in
focks swoop upon neighborhoods and
cities. Where you find one person with
sound throat, and keen eyesight, and
alert ear, and easy respiration, and regu-
lar pulsation, and supple limb and prime
digestion, and steady nerves, you find a
hundred who have to be very careful be-
cause this, or that, or the other physical
function is disordered.
Tho human intellect out of tune: The
Judgment wrongly swerved, or the
memory lcaky, or the will weak, or the
temper inflammabie, and the well-bal-
anced mind exceptional. Domestic life
out OF tune: Only here and there a con-
jugal outbreak of incompatiblity of
temper through the divorce courts, or a
hiiai outbreak about fathers will
through the surrogate's court, or case of
wife-beating or husband poisoning
through the criminal courts, but thousands
of families with June outside and January
within.
Society out of tune: Labor and capital,
their hands on each others throat. Spirit
of caste keeping those down in the social
scale in struggle to get up, and putting
those who are up in anxiety lest they have
to como down. No wonder the old piano.
forte of society is all out of tune, when
hypocrisy, and lying, and subterfuge, and
donhlo dealing, and sycophancy, and
charlatanism and revenge have for six
thousand years been banging away at the
keys and stamping the pedals.
On all sides there is perpetual ship.
wreck of harmonies. Nations in discord:
Without realizing it, 50 wrong is the feel.
ing of nation for nation that the symbols
chosen are fierce and destructive. In
this country, where our skies are full
of robins, and doves, and MORN
ing larks, We have our national symbol,
fierce and filthy eagle, as immoral bird
ms can be found in all the ornithological
catalogues. In Great Britain where they
have lambs and fallow deer, their symbol
is the merciless lion. In Russia, where,
from between her frozen north and bloom
ing south, all kindly beasts dwell, they
choose the growing bear, and in the
worlds heraldry favorite figure Is the
dragon, which is winged serpent,
ferocious and deathfui.
And so fond is the world of contention
that wc climb out through the heavens
and baptize one of the other planets with
the spirit of battle and call it Mars after
the god of war, and we give to the eighth
sign Of the zodiac the name of the
scorpion, creature which is chiefly cele.
brated for it's deadly sting. But, after all,
these symbols are expressive of the way
nation feels toward nation, Discord wide